Modeling spatial distributional patterns of benthic meiofauna species by Thomas and related processes

Spatial distributional patterns of benthic meiofauna in the presence of certain macrofauna species are of particular interest in the ecological research of tidal flats. The promotion of benthic meiofauna by macrofauna species is frequently observed in field experiments and is in part responsible for the spatial patchiness of such distributions. It is the aim of this paper to show how Thomas and related cluster processes can be used for a stochastic modeling of such patterns when only aggregate abundances of individuals from quadrat counts are available. In particular, three data samples of Harpacticus obscurus (Crustacea: Copepoda) from sites where the polychaete Lanice conchilega is predominant are analyzed.